You Were Brave in that Holy War
You have done well
In the contest of madness.
You were brave in that holy war.
You have all the honorable wounds
Of one who has tried to find love
Where the Beautiful Bird
Does not drink.
May I speak to you
Like we are close
And locked away together?
Once I found a stray kitten
And I used to soak my fingers
In warm milk;
It came to think I was five mothers
On one hand.
Wayfarer,
Why not rest your tired body?
Lean back and close your eyes.
Come morning
I will kneel by your side and feed you.
I will so gently
Spread open your mouth
And let you taste something of my
Sacred mind and life.
Surely
There is something wrong
With your ideas of
God
O, surely there is something wrong
With your ideas of
God
If you think
Our Beloved would not be so
Tender.
—The Gift: Poems by Hafiz the great Sufi Master
translated by Daniel Ladinsky
And so it is.
Blessèd Be.
3 comments On “You Were Brave in that Holy War”
When it comes to Hafiz, no comment I can make will do justice.
cath
It is worth your knowing that my little sister pulled up your site and read this wonderful piece to me last weekend while we were reminiscing of our dead father and his long struggle to understand a loving “G-d”.
We sat together in our mountain house and drank in these words.
Thank you for sharing them, dear fellow traveler.
Jacob Nordby
Author
The Divine Arsonist
Thank you, Jacob, for this message. It helped me this morning to be brought back again to read about the tenderness of the Beloved.
Michael
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